Kreyler didn't say anything; he just looked at me with those flat, hate-filled eyes.
I said, “I came after my cut of that silver that we took in the smuggler raid. And don't try to talk me out of it, because I'm going to get it one way or another.”
I told Kreyler with a look that he could go to hell. If he wanted to make his draw, it was all right with me. But nothing happened for a minute. The fat man and the Marshal looked at each other and I began to get the idea that they were cooking something between them, but I didn't know what. Basset wasn't armed, as far as I could see, and even if he did have a gun on him, I figured it would take him a week to find it among all the folds of fat. If it was just Kreyler's shooting ability that I had to worry about, I was all right.
“Well, now,” Basset said, “this is very irregular. Very irregular indeed, isn't it, Kreyler? I was under the impression that you had picked up your cut this morning, Cameron.” He didn't seem worried, and that in itself was something for me to worry about. “However,” he went on, “we always try to keep the men happy here in Ocotillo. Even the ungrateful ones. Of course, it will mean going into my own pocket, but just so there won't be any hard feelings, I'm willing to add a little to your cut. Say another thirty-five dollars. In silver.”
I said, “I was thinking that five hundred dollars would be about right.”
He didn't like that. Those little eyes began to narrow and I got the feeling that this was the time to be careful.
“Well, now,” he said, “that's a lot of money. But, like I say, we try to keep the men happy.”
Grunting, he reached across his desk and pulled the cigar box over. “I think maybe it can be done,” he said vaguely. “Five hundred. Yes, I think it can be done, don't you, Kreyler?”
And while he was talking he was opening the cigar box and fumbling around in it. I had seen him do it before, just the way he was doing it now, and it hadn't meant a thing. But this time it did. Something prodded me in the back of my mind and I knew that it wasn't a cigar that he was fumbling for.
It was a little double-barreled derringer, probably, but he didn't get to use it. I guess he intended to let me have both barrels right through the lid of the box, and it wasn't such a bad idea, at that, because one of those little belly guns can do damage out of all proportion to its size. It was a nice setup, all right. In another second he would have shot my belt buckle right through my backbone. If he had lived that long.
At times like that you appreciate your training, and when it came to guns I had one of the best educations in the world. My right hand took over where my brain left off, and what came next was as natural as reciting the multiplication tables. More natural for me.
So I shot him. It was as simple as that, and I didn't wait to see where the bullet hit, because I already knew. When Pappy Garret trained a man, he didn't leave any margin for doubt about things like that. After I had pulled the trigger I moved one foot just enough to pull my body around and lay the pistol on Kreyler.
As a gunman, maybe the Marshal was all right as long as he stayed in his own class, but he hadn't had the advantage of studying with an expert, the way I had. As it was, I had all the time in the world. I could have shot him twice before the front sight of his pistol cleared his holster, and Kreyler knew it. I guess there was an instant there when he was already seeing himself frying in hell, because his eyes got that sick look and he lost heart and didn't even try to get his pistol out.
There's one thing about gun fighting, when you start shooting it's hard to stop. The first thing a gunman learns is to start shooting the minute his hand hits the gun butt—that is, he starts cocking his pistol the instant he starts his draw. If he's good enough he's got his pistol cocked and is squeezing the trigger by the time he clears leather, and from then on it's almost automatic. You cock again as the gun goes down from recoil, shoot again, cock again, until you're out of ammunition.
That's the way it usually goes. That's the way Kreyler expected it to go this time, and from the way he looked, he was already feeling the shovels hit him in the face as they covered him up in some boothill grave. But about that time something stopped me. I broke off right in the middle of the cock-trigger action and just stood there looking at him.
For a while he didn't believe it. And neither did I. I couldn't think of any good reason why I shouldn't shoot him. He had been drawing on me. He and the fat man had set a nice little trap for me. On top of that, I should have shot him just because of the principle of the thing, if for no other reason, because in the school I had attended they taught never to pull a gun on a man unless you meant to kill him.
This was the second time I had pulled on Kreyler. And he wasn't dead yet.
But finally I began to understand what had happened. In the heat of the fight I had forgotten that Kreyler was a U.S. marshal, and I guess it was instinct alone that held my trigger finger just in time.
After a minute Kreyler began to realize why I hadn't killed him, and I think it crossed his mind that maybe he could make his draw and shoot me while I was worrying about it. But it was just a fleeting thought. I didn't want to kill him, but I would if he forced it. And he knew it.
No more than two or three seconds had passed since I had put a bullet into Basset, but at that moment it seemed like years ago. I realized that I had been holding my breath, so now I let it go.
I said, “Just move easy, unbuckle your belt, and kick your pistol over here.” —
He hesitated a moment, then his pistol hit the floor and he kicked it over. I heard somebody running in the saloon, so I stepped over to the door and saw the bartender diving under the bar. After a shotgun, I figured. But he got peaceful when he saw me standing there, and all he came up with was a rag.
“Go over to one of those tables,” I said, “and sit there until I think of something for you to do.”
His Adam's apple went up and down a few times, as if he were trying to swallow his stomach, then he went over to a table and sat down, still holding onto the rag. Then there was a commotion outside the saloon and in a minute Bama and Marta came bursting through the batwings. They hurried on back and stopped at the doorway of Basset's office, looking in.
“My God,” Bama said weakly. He wiped his hand across his mouth, looking as if he needed a drink. Marta didn't do anything except stare at me.
I said, “Keep an eye on the bartender, Bama. How much racket did I make?”
“Plenty,” he gulped. “My God, did you have to kill him?”
“Of course I had to kill him. He was getting ready to shoot me with that derringer in his cigar box.”
I turned them and glanced at Basset for the first time. He was sprawled out in his chair, as formless as three hundred pounds of lard in a hot room, and getting more formless all the time. There was a black little hole about nine inches below his left shoulder, but there wasn't any blood to speak of.
I said, “You've been around here a while, Bama. How much excitement is this going to cause?”
“Plenty when Basset's men find out. That will take a little time, though. We heard the shooting upstairs, but I doubt if anybody else did.”